At the urging of a couple of comments in the previous post, here's an updated version of the propose shoulders-square female figure. The new one's on the left, with "more finishing details" like toenails, better hands, etc. and slimmer hips, along with arms more akimbo:

I'd like to get your feedback on two possible female templates. The image below has the two generic ones (with faces for reference) in the middle, then two sample characters with outfits on so you can see how they might look dressed.

The major change has been in the pose. We discovered that trying to put a female in the pose the male is in -- arms akimbo, held out from the body, weight evenly distributed, feet on the same level -- made her look very mannish, no matter what her body was like. At the end of the day, the point of this whole thing is to get a drawing that looks good, as if it were commissioned at a convention by a real comics artist, NOT to make my life easier. So I am probably going to have to abandon the concept that the poses would be exactly the same and that it would be up to the user to put it however they wanted. That's still possible, but I have to make the default image, I think, the best it can possibly be for those who don't want to go the extra mile.

Many thanks to Hammerknight for putting together the following tutorials AND a fun Halloween card, too! As always, click on any of the images to see them full size, and please let HK know what you think in the comments.

I'm working my way through a great usability study Mark Shute did (for which he got an outstanding A+ in a 700 level course -- woot Mark!). Before I actually hack up the code, I wanted to present the basic layout and concept here for your input and feedback.

In general, you don't want to associate yourself with a chicken when planning your super-adventuring career. I'm not saying chickens are bad animals, I'm just saying they're stupid, prone to killing themselves in spectacularly foolish ways, smelly, cowardly, and tasty when deep fried, none of which are attributes you particularly want to identify yourself with.

Unfortunately, no one gave Black Talon the memo:

I get that he's a big scary voodoo guy, but somehow he missed the point that while chickens commonly appear in voodoo rituals, it's almost always as a result of having their heads chopped off and their blood drained into a bowl for drinking!

Besides the alarming connotations (has he never even HEARD of KFC?!), this costume has other problems. First, you never want to consider an outfit that involves a diaper. If you're incontinent or prone to wetting yourself when danger threatens, maybe super villainy isn't your ideal career choice.

Second, the hard and fast rule of super-adventuring is that no one can successfully pull off a bird beak as part of their headgear. Not even Hawkman.

Finally, no costume should ever involve bird feet. Ever. They look ridiculous and will inevitably trip you up if you need to flee the scene which, let's be honest, is quite likely if you're oblivious enough to name yourself after a chicken.